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Fiat 806: research and scratchbuilds


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Introduction

This thread was started intending to unite those interested in building the Fiat 806 based on thorough research and photogrammetry. See also the great Fiat 806 Gangshow build album. In the current thread there will be (at least I hope people will post) extensive research on the original car, photographs, drawings, literature and archives. Beside that the thread will feature scratchbuilding progress based on the findings. Perhaps in the future there could be exchanges of resin molded scratch parts, just like Vontrips kindly did with the tyres (for example: body panels / grille?)

 

Index

To start off I have gone through all of the Gangshow topic and I indexed all knowhow (see end of this post). Best way to use it: click a link, go back and click the next link etc. Or open the links in a separate browser tab. Each link represents one post only, so it's better to only read that post, come back to the index and click the next link. The index was created having in mind those who are about to work on a certain subject, such as the steering wheel. For the index, see end of this opening post.

 

Visual reference material

First a legal disclaimer. All images are used for educational and referential purposes. Copyrights lie with the copyright holders. Centro Storico Fiat is probably the original copyright holder of many of these images. Centro Storico's website can be accessed here and here. It has a Facebook page here. Be sure to have a look at their great collection of photos of classic Fiat and Lancia cars. Centro Storico also has frequent Twitter updates featuring photographs, see here. Drawing 6 was found here.

 

All copyrights of the photos / screenshots 10-19 lie with Cinecitta Luce. My presentation of the low-definition photos on this forum is just for reference and educational purposes, for the purpose of a hobby. I do not have a corporate license for the use of these images. If at any point in time Cinecitta Luce wishes these pictures removed I will remove them upon first request. The pictures are not to be reproduced on another website or another written work. Please, all, respect Cinecitta Luce's copyrights. Their website is to be found here. All rights to Photo 9 lie with Fotogeca Gilardi, see here. There you can inquire about the cost to purchase a license of a full-scale version of Photo 9. 

 

Important: some pictures, such as Photo 1, Photo 2, Drawing 2, Drawing 3 and Drawing 6, are larger than shown here. To enlarge, right-click on the picture and choose 'open new tab', then click on the picture on the new tab. 

 

Update 31 July 2018: there are now so many pictures in this post that it's very difficult to navigate. To restore overview I left out several images that are less important. 28 out of 67 images remain. All images are still available for download here.  

 

 

Photo 1AAA

 

37062248335_29486037d3_o.jpg 

 

Photo 2

 

37062248635_e7eae862c4_o.jpg 

 

Photo 3

 

36254779723_104d7cc3d7_o.jpg 

 

Photo 28A

33064627016_6993258cc5_b.jpg 

 

Photo 4B

 

mH8HQM.png 

 

Photo 6B

 

30930525962_5eef57c194_o.png 

 

Photo 7F

 

qXGMU9.jpg 

 

Photo 8B

 

rDK9Yo.png  

 

Photo 9

 

30950886626_3c8070f2fc_b.jpg 

 

Photo 10

 

31006023485_966cf6bf66_b.jpg 

 

Photo 12

 

30765694204_946852ec03_h.jpg 

 

Photo 17

 

30797291593_a520323b9b_h.jpg 

 

Photo 21

 

31189244162_ff79402b98_z.jpg 

 

 

Photo 23B

32096152036_de6fb8cabb_b.jpg

 

Photo 24

 

G94DaD.png 

 

Photo 25

 

NKNVIf.png

 

 

 

Documentary

 

These are the contents of the documentary (references in this overview), insofar most relevant for the Fiat 806. A full transcription, with correct chronology, is to be found here

 

  • 01:01 - Fiat 806 (#15), front view, being cleaned. Grille shape, car width, front wheel camber, steer linkage, tyre width, manual crank opening position, suspension position, metal wind shield are shown. No number '15' visible on radiator or bonnets. No dent (compare photo 9) visible. There is symmetry in bonnet bulges. 
  • 03:14 - Fiat 806 (#15) is pushed toward the start line, for the start of heat 2. All numbers '15' have been applied. There is no dent in the radiator housing. Moments after this video was filmed, Photos 4 and 10 were taken. 
  • 03:22 - Fiat 806 (#15) is seen from the left, close-up. The 'rear wheel louvres', exhaust pipe-to-body connector, steering wheel, seat (with rain cover?), gas cap, left hand body lining, glass window, mechanical windshield and rear number '15' are seen up close.
  • 05:12 - Close-up of the Fiat 806 (#15). The left bonnet and part of the '5' is seen. There is a rain cover over the glass window. 
  • 05:15 - Low side view of the Fiat 806 (#15). This is the lowest view we have of this car to date, which makes it very valuable to assess the height of the wheels in comparison to that of the body. This is final proof that the body was indeed significantly lower than Drawing 1 and the kit would imply. Left to the Fiat, there is the Bugatti 35C (#24) driven by Aymo Maggi. Only one umbrella is up so there can't be too much rain at this point.
  • 05:22 - The start of the final heat. The Fiat 806 is gloriously captured spurting away. Two days ago someone said in this thread 'what I'd give to have seen this care race'... probably this is as close as we're going to get at that. It is great to be able to witness this wonderful day in September 1927. For our research this scene is relevant mainly because Bordino steers his car a bit, so that it is seen from different views - in ONE camera shot. That is very fortunate.
  • 05:41 - At Curva Sud, the Fiat 806 is seen in first position. 
  • 07:07 - Fiat 806 is seen up-close, from the right side this time. The glass screen is now very well seen. Also the tyre pattern, for example. The metallic windscreen is seen as well. 

 

 

Drawing 1A

Fiat-806-Corsa.gif

 

Drawing 2F.1 

43045289294_68a8eca245_o.jpg 

 

Drawing 2F.2

 

28824952037_42865ffe64_o.jpg 

 

Drawing 3

 

31069654665_cd913c8980_o.jpg

 

 

 

Drawing 5

 

30864856612_0114caef64_b.jpg 

 

Drawing 6

 

fiat_806_corsa.jpeg 

Engine Drawing 1

 

22790736108_89f7d3a2b6_z.jpg 

 

Engine Drawing 2

 

25333687509_9582c24989.jpg 

 

Engine Drawing 3

 

31064047416_242bbc7928_o.jpg 

 

Engine Drawing 4

 

y4M7P4.jpg 

 

Engine Drawing 5

 

YKO1PB.jpg 

 

Engine Drawing 6

32096350126_160908e833_b.jpg 

 

 

The hereunder index is updated up to & including: November 10 2016

 

BODY AND GRILLE

- Hood hinges, see also here and here and here and here and here

- Replacing the louvres, see also here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here

- Grille color, see also here

- Body color, see also here

 

CAR GENERAL SHAPE RESEARCH, INCLUDING PHOTOGRAMMETRY 

- General body shape photogrammetry, see also here and here  and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here

- Comparing two photos, see also here

- Body should be lower (and other changes), see also here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here

- Grille changes, see also here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here

- Cutaway drawing accuracy, see also here and here[ and here 

 

CHASSIS, FRAME AND SUSPENSION

- Amending springs, see also here and here and here

- Turning dampers, see also here and here 

 

GENERAL KNOWLEDGE ON CAR AND TECHNIQUES

- Colors, steering wheel, windscreen

- Engine, radiator, grille

- Color of rails, see also here

- Photos of pre-war race cars details, see also here

- Article about vintage car paint, wired wheels et cetera

- 3D-printing, see also here and here 

- Upcoming 1:1 Fiat 806 replica?

 

ENGINE

- General engine corrections, steering idler arm correction, see also here and here and here

- New filler cap

- Engine sump, see also here

- Casting engine covers, see also here and here 

- Spark plugs, see also here and here and here and here

- Plug leads and wiring, see also here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here

- Fill certain gaps?, see also here and here and here and here

- Correcting cylinder head ends

- Correcting PVC tubes, see also here

- Collector tubes?, see also here and here and here and here and here

- Correct stand 121D

- Valve springs

 

EXHAUST

- Exhaust issues

- Color of exhaust

 

INTERIOR, EXCEPT STEERING WHEEL 

- Gear shift

- Instrument panel: turning gauge bezels, see also here and here and here 

 

STEERING WHEEL

- Steering wheel boss replacement, 12 or 16 holes in wheel, see also here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here

- New spokes

- Transparent part, see also here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here

- General steering wheel amendments, see also here

Ignition timing lever and brodie knob, see also here and here and here and here and here and here

- Steering column, see also here 

 

WHEELS AND DRUM BRAKES

- Spoke count, see also here and here and here

- Respoking and nipples, see also here and here and here and here and

here and here and here and here and here

- Spoke color

- Drum size photogrammetry

- Comparison Protar and Italeri wheels

- Color of drum brakes and wheels

- Creating a mold

- Newly cast tyre, see also here and here

- Replacement drums, see also here and here and here and here and here

- Adding cooling vents to drums and here

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Hello guys,

 

I had bought the proof (see above) that 24B needed to be longer (6,5 mm). I have added pieces of cluster (right word?) to extend it. Now, it's correct. Here is an example of modif not very difficult but that will make a nearer from truth model.

 

ddAJTT.jpg

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pTYg2A.jpg

 

hopMZ8.jpg

 

gGVB55.jpg

 

Z5omix.jpg

 

Dear friends,

 

Ok, my decision is taken. I will post only on this thread. I sent my last post on the Gangshow to inform the reader of this decision. Posting takes a lot of time an I don't want to post on both threads. So... 

1st photo: inspired by the photo of Bordino just above, I began to modify the shape of the cockpit left side (the right side is correct). I made a mistake and cut a little too much on the front. I'll have to add a little piece of plastic card to get the good shape.

The other important change is about the height of the body, to reduce on the kit, as John's overlay showed obviously. The difference of height is probably more important, but I made a compromise, because I am afraid of consequences to insert the engine, the steering wheel etc.

So, I removed 4 mm on the rear (up to the rear wheel) and 5 mm from this wheel to the front of the car.

I dive into the unknown, hoping I will fall on my legs...

 

Best regards

 

P.S: I am gonna change the radiator grille (not the one I made, I mean the 130 and 131 D piece. I would like to use a photoetched  grille from Eduard or Aber. What do you think of this one?

CvN7ny.png

Edited by Olivier de St Raph
arrow added on photo
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My Topic for today is preparatons for our construction.What I consider as most important,is to replace most of the kit screws by tiny bolts.We will also Need brass profiles,sheets ,tubes,rods and other metal parts,but These Things can be bought later on

I will give you now a list of  imho very useful metal parts for the beginning:

Bolts 1.4mm , 6mm Long   50 pcs

Nuts 1,4mm    25 pcs

Washers 1,4 mm    25 pcs

Thread rods 1,4 mm  3 pcs

Bolt Driver (very important!)

Thats the starter set,In Germany you can buy all These Things and much more in the Knupfer shop.Believe me,I don´t get Money for advertisement,but for me this shop is the Mekka,where we can get almost everything we Need for our construction.Take a look!

A personal note:Because I am an old-fashioned guy regarding modern communications,I´m not used to send or to get emails.

My email adress is the Office pc of my sister,where almost every unknown email can be found in the spam filter.

So if someone of you felt unattended in the past.Please forgive me!

In the future,it might be necessary to Change personal adresses for sending parts.Please tell me in the official thread,if you sent me an important email,so I can open it  in this spam filter

Many greetings from good old Germany!  Hannes

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@Olivier de St Raph You mentioned that you'll write an article for Tamiya Magazine. Do you have a deadline for that? Are you bound by a date this project needs to be finalized?

 

Back to measuring... one thing I think nobody thought of until now regarding the grille (or I must have missed it).... explaining why the left grille spokes are shorter than the right grille spokes, as discussed before.... is that the hole for the crank is not in the center! That's because the engine is positioned to the left. See the red arrow:

 

30881247856_b6de01d735_b.jpg

 

Knowing this and taking another look at photo 7 I ask myself, how could I have missed this...  

 

30791575662_e99915611a_b.jpg

 

This points out yet another flaw in Drawing 1 by the way.

 

One more thing I measured is that the front wheels touching the ground had the same relative distance as did the rear wheels. But the front wheels having different camber settings, this means that the distance between front utmost left part of left wheel and utmost right part of right wheel was longer than the distance between the rear wheels. See the blue arrows.

Edited by Roy vd M.
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And it would further seem, again according to Drawing 2, that the engine was fitted in a slight angle. I conclude this because the crank does not line up with the center of the engine. 

 

It does make sense: the bonnet is very low, way lower than all the other bonnets of racing cars of that time... a way to have a large engine (it's still 12 cilinders, 1,5 litres or not) fit underneath a low bonnet like that could be to tilt the engine. It's not unusual in sports or racing cars. An example that comes to my mind is the Mercedes 300 SL:

 

453eafc839a63db876185098bc580d0b.jpg

 

(Image posted on Media-Cache, copyright holder unknown, educational and reference purposes only, picture will be deleted upon first request)

 

All of this applies if Drawing 2 is correct in this aspect. Further research on that is necessary. 

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Hello guys, 

1) I don't have a precise deadline but let's say that it would be a good thing if my model and my article were over around january. I think it should be OK (hope so)

2) Roy, your finding about the hole is very good. Now that you said that, it is obvious on the photo...

3) I agree with you about the lenght of the front and rear transversal transmission arms: they have the same lenght, but because the front ones are diagonally mounted (as I said above), they seem to be longer.

4) Your last post about the angle the engine was fitted is very interesting and probably right, but we don't know the value of this angle. 

Practically, I will probably have no choice if I want to insert my engine in my decreased in height body...

 

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2 hours ago, Roy vd M. said:

 

Good spot with the offset starter crank Roy, I had missed that.

 

The rear wheels should have no camber due to the solid live axle.

 

Not sure about the slanted engine angle though. A good draughtsman would show this in the plan with offset components. I'm viewing on a phone so can't judge, but I'm sure the engine is symmetrical on its horizontal centre line. Take the top half and flip it to check.

 

Trimmed post to keep things tidy!

Edited by vontrips
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Roy et al,

 

Even for you, that first post in this thread was epic in its thoroughness. Excellent as always.

 

Spent a couple of hours this week seeing what things looked like in Blender.

 

806 scrap view

Relatively quick to get a rough shape. Started with the "drawing 1" outline then re-scaled to "drawing 2". They are very different. Have both lines

 

Clearly the colours here are not right. I need contrast so I could see edges.

 

Much more work to do - frame does not go past radiator at the moment.

 

More interested in which set of lines is correct so playing with a little much criticised "photogrammetry" on 90 year photos. Not convinced it will lead to anything.

 

Finally, glad you'd spotted that the starter handle is offset. I'd thought that might be the root of your issues but did not have the time to work it through.

 

All the Best

 

Nick

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Slightly lower tech research!

 

IMAG4352_zpsxtsslfw3.jpg

 

This is another very quick and dirty test I conducted a while back. Photographed off screen on my phone, (such is my high technology at the moment!).

 

It's certainly not what I would call empirical data, as my camera angle is not perfect, but have no choice at the moment to reshoot as Rich has collected his model.

 

Ideally, on my own model I planned to use the chassis as my datum and photograph my tweaks as I went for a more accurate assessment. Spurned onto putting this up as Olivier has dived into chopping his bodywork already.

 

On this overlay I've lined the layers up on the chassis rails as the datum point.

 

Points of note:

 

Cockpit coaming way off.

 

Steering wheel lower and more vertical (4mm body lowering will sort this-ish.

 

Tail seems shorter confirming Hannes thoughts.

 

Front wheels do have positive camber. Beware though, all the wheels are skewed towards top right and exaggerate the camber - cannot get this shape on my camera. Even the back wheels look cambered, which is impossible with a live axle!

 

Not convinced about the wider track from drawing 2. Not seen any evidence of width errors in my photos of the model,.

Edited by vontrips
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VT - I was impressed by the match when I saw the earlier thread. I'm finding it much more difficult than that with the tools. Problem with cars is there are almost no straight lines, wheels move up and down and aren't necessarily parallel in any plane. The only saving grace is the plane of symmetry - which of course the 806 doesn't have - nightmare. Maybe I will just abandon the tech and reach for a phone!

 

Nick

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5 hours ago, Olivier de St Raph said:

4) Your last post about the angle the engine was fitted is very interesting and probably right, but we don't know the value of this angle. 

Practically, I will probably have no choice if I want to insert my engine in my decreased in height body...

 

4 hours ago, vontrips said:

Not sure about the slanted engine angle though. A good draughtsman would show this in the plan with offset components. I'm viewing on a phone so can't judge, but I'm sure the engine is symmetrical on its horizontal centre line. Take the top half and flip it to check.

 

I was probably wrong about the slanted engine angle. Indeed the drawing of the engine turns out to be symmetrical. Comparing to a side drawing of the engine and adding some guidelines it appears that the crank lines up to one of two parallel 'circles'. See here the green circle:

 

30888194246_d444e4c803_b.jpg

 

Could it be that the crank doesn't line up with what we now call 'crankshaft'? 

 

4 hours ago, NickD said:

Even for you, that first post in this thread was epic in its thoroughness. Excellent as always.

 

Spent a couple of hours this week seeing what things looked like in Blender.

 

Thanks Nick for the compliment. I spent about 9 hours (!!!!!) processing all of the Gangshow thread to make the index. 

 

I'm extremely happy to see you join the discussion and take Blender for a spin. Great stuff!

 

3 hours ago, Hannes said:

 

Dear Nick,the drawing 2 Shows a possible successor for our Monza car ,that unfortunately was never buildt.(maybe for 1928). But your work is very ,very interesting.Good job!  Hannes

 

 

How do you know Drawing 2 doesn't represent the car on the photographs? It looks very close in several aspects, and much closer than drawing 1.

 

2 hours ago, vontrips said:

Slightly lower tech research!

 

But nonetheless results that strongly support the theory that the kit body lines are too high, overall.

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Dear Roy ,in drawing 2 I can see alot of improvements compared to our Monza car regarding the aerodynamics. The small tail was changed into a much more stabilizing form and the wind-hood was made flatter too. It´s like in formula1 today,improvement never stops (until the boss stops it...) Hannes

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